I’m terribly
frustrated trying to get my Garmin GPS76 to talk with my new Dell laptop,
which is equipped with a Targus port replicator that can supposedly translate
the Garmin’s standard serial connection to the Dell’s USB port.
C.R., via e-mailI haven’t
heard of specific Targus or Dell serial-to-USB adaptor problems but can
tell you that a lot of navigators are having trouble connecting perfectly
good GPSs to perfectly good PCs using adaptor technology. It’s true
that USB stands for Universal Serial Bus, and thus we might presume that
the conversion is fairly trivial. But silly us! Apparently USB and the
20-year-old serial bus standard, often called RS232, are technically very
different, and hence there’s a lot going on inside the adaptors.

In fact, you haven’t
seen the worst of it. When some users try what you’re doing, Windows
thinks the GPS is some weird mouse, and the cursor starts hopping around
out of control. The fix for “crazy mouse” is fairly easy. You
go into the Windows Device Manager and tell it to ignore the phantom Microsoft
Serial Ballpoint Mouse—easy, that is, once you’ve unplugged
the GPS, rebooted the crazed computer, and found someone to explain what’s
going on.

Unfortunately, I’d
guess that your particular problem runs deeper, and I am not in a position
to troubleshoot it from here. However, let me recommend a small (and slightly
eccentric) outfit called Purple Computing that specializes in solving
any and all Garmin cable issues. The company has lots of information about
this serial-to-USB business on its Web site, www.pfranc.com, and—perhaps
more important—claims to have an adaptor that positively works. If
you ever decide to connect more marine electronics to your computer, you
might consider a specifically NMEA multiplexer/adaptor like the one from
ShipModul at right.

As to why so many contemporary
laptops come without RS232 ports, I can only guess that it’s “smaller
is better” design thinking run amok. GPSs and plotters are just starting
to appear with their own USB ports, but it will be some time before that’s
the norm.

(Editor’s note:
Since C.R. and I corresponded, Dell helped him reinstall his USB drivers—which
did the trick—and Garmin went so far as to send him an alternate
adaptor, which also worked. He’s feeling much better about both companies’
customer support departments.) —B.E.